The Dodgers are rolling again, and Max Muncy had plenty to do with it.
Los Angeles beat the Phillies 9-5 on Wednesday at Citizens Bank Park, stretching its winning streak to two after dropping two straight. It was another game where the Dodgers had to keep answering, and they kept finding the bigger swing.
Philadelphia jumped first in the opening inning when Alec Bohm, for the second straight night, set the tone early. After driving in the Phillies’ lone run on Tuesday, he went deep again Wednesday, a two-out, two-run homer off Eric Lauer to put the home side in front.
Aaron Nola looked sharp early, too. He came in with a 5.68 ERA and made the Dodgers look uncomfortable right away by retiring eight straight to open the game.
But Dalton Rushing finally cracked through in the third, blasting a two-out homer to deep center field. The shot snapped an 0-19 slump and cut the Phillies’ lead to one.
Nola’s early rhythm didn’t last. After breezing through his first two innings on just 18 pitches, he needed 34 pitches to get through the third and fourth. The Dodgers kept chipping away in the fifth, stringing together two singles before Rushing delivered again, this time with a two-run double that put Los Angeles ahead.
Lauer settled in after Bohm’s first-inning blast, allowing just one walk over his next three innings while retiring eight in a row. The Phillies answered in the fifth with a little power of their own. Bryan De La Cruz, making his Phillies debut, drew a walk and then hammered his first big league homer since 2024 to tie the game at 3.
Then came the sixth, and with it, Muncy.
Freddie Freeman opened the inning with his second double in as many at-bats, moving him into a tie with Robinson Canó and Hall of Fame catcher Iván Rodríguez for 26th on the all-time doubles list with 572. Muncy followed by driving a two-run homer to left-center, flipping the game back in the Dodgers’ favor at 5-3.
That swing carried extra weight. It was Muncy’s second straight game with a home run and his third in six games.
The blast was his 229th as a Dodger, moving him past Ron Cey for second on the franchise’s Los Angeles home run list. He also joined Shohei Ohtani as the only Dodgers with at least 20 homers this season.
The homer also put Lauer in position for the win. He matched Nola with 5 1/3 innings, and the Dodgers have now won all eight games he’s appeared in. Lauer is 4-0 with the club.
Los Angeles kept adding in the late innings. Kyle Tucker, who finished the series hitless in Philadelphia, brought home an insurance run with a sacrifice fly in the eighth. Tommy Edman, after seeing his nine-game hitting streak end Tuesday, responded with a three-hit night and capped the eighth with a bases-clearing triple that pushed the lead to 9-3.
The Phillies got a run back on Bohm’s RBI single in the bottom of the eighth, giving him four RBIs over his last two games. J.T. Realmuto added another RBI single in the ninth, but that was the end of it against the Dodgers bullpen.
The win gave Los Angeles a 4-2 edge in the season series, its first season-series win over Philadelphia since 2023. It also comes with the Dodgers still holding a half-game lead over the Milwaukee Brewers for the best record in baseball after Milwaukee beat the New York Mets.
The Dodgers are off Thursday before heading to Queens for a three-game series against the New York Mets beginning Friday at 4:10 p.m. PT on SportsNet LA. Roki Sasaki is set to face Sean Manaea.
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